Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) is making a lot of waves with some highly controversial statements about unemployment insurance and tax cuts. Here’s Talking Points Memo’s Brian Beutler on Kyl:
The second highest ranking Republican in the Senate doubled down on a controversial statement he made this weekend, arguing in
This morning, the Labor Department announced that initial weekly jobless claims fell to 454,000. The number of people continuing to receive benefits fell to the lowest level in seven months, in large part due to Congress’ inability to renew federally extended benefits. The broader trend remains: Initial claims More…
I wanted to pull out part of my article from this morning, as it makes a somewhat confusing but nevertheless important point. Most policy experts and economists think that unemployment insurance discourages people from looking for work or accepting jobs offered to them, keeping them unemployed for longer — More…
Michele Walker lost her job working for a rental management company in the Pittsburgh area in the spring of 2008. She had held a job for the past 21 years, and figured that she, her husband and her adult son would be fine until she could find work again. More…
The unemployed now know that Congress cannot help them — at least not yet. After attempting to gain cloture and move forward to a majority-rules vote on an extension of federal unemployment benefits three times in as many weeks, the Senate finally gave up and went home. Moderate Republican Sens. More…
On Wednesday night, a bare-bones measure to keep federally funded unemployment insurance checks headed to the long-term unemployed failed in the Senate. Moderate Republican Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine had signed on to vote for cloture on the $34 billion bill. But without Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), More…
Here we go again. Last night, Sens. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Max Baucus (D-Mont.), the Senate majority leader and the head of the Senate Finance Committee, introduced a new unemployment extension bill. It is not actually strictly standalone: It includes an extension of the period in which homebuyers can close More…
This afternoon, the House failed to pass a standalone bill that would have extended federal unemployment insurance benefits. Last week, the jobs bill pending in the Senate — containing those benefits as well as Medicaid aid for states and dozens of other provisions — died. Each week that Congress fails More…
The House is currently voting to move a standalone unemployment insurance bill, and I’ll update when they are done.
But encouraging news from the Senate side as well for unemployed Americans looking for a benefits extension. A Senate Democratic leadership aide says Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is working More…
This week, the Senate might turn to Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.)’s standalone bill to continue federally extended unemployment insurance benefits.* The jobs bill, also known as H.R. 4213 or the extenders package, that included the extension along with a number of other provisions failed to move forward to More…
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